Dave Treen

Dave Treen (16 July 1928-29 October 2009) was a member of the US House of Representatives (R-LA 3) from 3 January 1973 to 10 March 1980 (succeeding Patrick T. Caffery and preceding Billy Tauzin) and Governor of Louisiana from 10 March 1980 to 12 March 1984 (interrupting Edwin Edwards' terms).

Biography
Dave Treen was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana in 1928, and he served in the US Air Force from 1951 to 1952 during the Korean War. In 1960, he was elected as a Dixiecrat presidential elector for Harry F. Byrd, and, in 1962, he left the Democratic Party to join the Republican Party due to the conservative shift in the national Republican Party. He ran for the US House of Representatives in 1962, 1964, and 1968, and his 1968 campaign was a narrow defeat with 48.8% of the vote in the New Orleans area. In 1972, he was defeated in his gubernatorial campaign while running against Edwin Edwards, but he was elected to the US House of Representatives during a Republican wave across the country brought about by Richard Nixon's re-election. He was solidly conservative in his views, and he resigned in 1980 when he was elected Governor. During his governorship, Treen established new schools in the state, appointed more African-Americans to state offices than had any previous governor in his state's history, supported equal teaching of creationism and evolution (overturned in 1987 because of separation of church and state), and resumed the use of capital punishment. He was infamous for his indecision and micromanagement of details, for failing to push for strong conservative policies and governmental reforms, and for failing to oust Edwards' allies from his administration. In 1983, he was defeated for re-election by Edwards, and he endorsed Edwards' re-election in 1991 due to the Republican Party's nomination of the white supremacist David Duke as their gubernatorial candidate. In 1999, his congressional comeback failed with 1,812 votes. He died in 2009, a year after another failed congressional campaign.